Louder Than Words (17 page)

She sat back in the chair and looked at me. Her face was calm, but Silas’s was a mass of frustration.

‘I thought she really wanted to do it this time,’ he said.

I do . . . don’t . . . do . . . Oh, how can I want to when I don’t even know how it feels to talk any more?

‘I think she does or she wouldn’t be sitting here now,’ Andrea replied. ‘But it’s been a long time and there are some very big barriers to overcome first. Rome wasn’t built in a day and Rafi won’t be cured in one either! You have to be patient.’

He gave her a rueful smile. ‘I guess.’

‘You often see a backward slide before an improvement.’ She was talking to me as well as him. ‘It’s as if, when the sufferer begins to see there’s a real possibility of the mutism being over, when that starts to become tangible, they panic and retreat. But it’s a very important part of the process. It may look like moving backwards, but in fact it’s a giant step forward. Now, Rafi, I want you to take another step. I want you to think of one thing associated with you becoming mute that I don’t know about, and maybe even Silas doesn’t. And I want you to tell us. Can you try, please?’

One very obvious thing occurred to me. The thing I’d lied about last time. I was ashamed that first time, ashamed of what it would reveal about my family.

But something else had happened as Silas dragged up that prep school memory. At the time I was horrified about my mother going into the school to complain. I’d heard her shout so often. What if she did that in the school? I’d
die
. Better not to make a fuss. I stood in the hall as she was leaving me with Kerensa so she could go and raise hell with the Head – her description not mine. I stared and stared at her with tears falling down my face, willing her to understand, but she didn’t even look at me. It had to be her way of course. I hated her for doing that.

Now, looking back years later, I saw something different in that memory. I saw her anger at her child being hurt, and I saw her going all out to protect me.

A lump formed in my throat.

I’d never seen it that way before.

She was outside somewhere now, sitting in her car, waiting for us.

The lump in my throat pressed more painfully and my eyes stung with some unshed tears. Maybe a tiny bit of her did care about me.

I took hold of the pen again. It might be important to tell this. It might help me get better.

I didn’t tell the truth last time I was here. It wasn’t Carys I stopped talking to first. It was Mum. But she didn’t notice.

Andrea read what I’d written with her usual careful therapist’s give-nothing-away face, but Silas winced.

‘Why did you say it was Carys?’

She was the first one to realise. I did stop talking to her eventually, but Carys realised it before Mum did.

Could anyone blame me for thinking Mum didn’t care after that?

But she was here now. And she was waiting for me. Had I got it wrong back then? What if she cared more than I’d thought?

To love is so startling it leaves little time for anything else.

(Emily Dickinson)

CHAPTER 30

A new coffee shop had opened on the high street and Josie and I went to try it out on Friday after school. It wasn’t one of the big chains but a rip-off looky-like. But the coffee was just as good, and the cookies. Plus it was right on our doorstep and not much was. It got our seal of approval all right.

Josie was telling me about a fantastic plan she’d come up with for us for the weekend. We were going to the zoo tomorrow. I had never been to the zoo before, not even on a school trip. This was another thing I loved about Josie. Out of nowhere, she would come up with something exciting to do.

‘Always try to do something awesome at least once a month, that’s my motto!’ she said, as I grinned and waved my hands about in a general effort to show my appreciation of her efforts. ‘Life is too short to waste.’

I guess many people didn’t know the truth of that as well as she did.

Rachel, Toby and the group from sixth form came in. Rachel and the girls waved at us while they queued.

‘Your brother not with them?’ Josie asked.

That was odd. He’d told me he had something on with his friends after school. I shrugged.

Once they’d got their orders, they came over to sit at the table next to us.

‘Any good?’ Clare asked Josie, gesturing at her coffee mug.

‘Actually, yeah, very,’ Josie said. ‘We’re impressed.’

‘What’ve you done with Silas?’ Toby asked. ‘I thought he was hanging out with you guys tonight.’

I shook my head and pointed at them. They looked puzzled.

‘She thought he was with you,’ Josie explained.

‘No,’ Rachel said. ‘He hasn’t been out with us for a while. We pretty much only see him in school these days.’

Josie frowned, remembering as I was all the times Silas said he was with them . . . or rather, he hadn’t exactly said that, but he must have known that was what we thought.

So where was he?

‘Hmm,’ Rachel said, with a conspiratorial glance at Clare. ‘I think someone is seeing someone, don’t you?’

Toby glowered and sank down in his chair. Clare laughed. ‘I think so too.’

‘Aww, it’s nice,’ Rachel said. ‘I like her. She’ll be good for him, not like all those “yes, Silas, no, Silas” types he usually ends up with.’

Clare rolled her eyes. ‘He always ends up with them because they engineer it. I don’t think he’s ever actually asked one of them out properly on a date.’

So they all thought he was probably out with Lara. But why was he keeping it so quiet? Toby’s sullen face might be a clue to that.

‘Do you think he was with her that night he texted you to say he wasn’t coming home?’ Josie asked when we were on our way back to her place.

That stopped me in my tracks. Perhaps he had been. But if he was so into her, why hadn’t he told me? He’d always talked to me about things like that before.

I felt jealousy bite with jagged teeth.

The news was on when we got to Josie’s house and her dad was watching it while he was getting ready to go out to work, hastily eating a bowl of stir-fry at the kitchen counter.

‘Police from across the Home Counties have been drafted in to support the Metropolitan Police in managing tomorrow’s protest in the capital,’ the news reporter announced. ‘The anticipated protests by various groups about the level of profits made by the global multinationals have been causing concern. While many of the groups involved have made it clear they expect the protests to be peaceful, a significant minority are said to be preparing for the kind of disturbances London saw in the student riots. Angry at what they say is the exploitation of people in developing countries at the expense of the fat-cat West, their leaders have been using social media sites to whip up support for vandalism and occupation of premises tomorrow. London braces itself for disruption, and the police brace themselves for a difficult day.’

‘Are you involved in that?’ Josie asked.

‘Yeah, I’ve been pulled in. We all have.’ Her dad shook his head at the TV and carried on speed-eating his dinner.

‘I was going to ask him for a lift to the zoo,’ Josie whispered glumly. ‘Do you think your mum will drop us off and pick us up?’

I almost laughed. Of course she wouldn’t.

‘You could try,’ Josie said pleadingly.

I nodded. If she wanted me to do that, I’d better go home and ask now in case Mum was going out.

I was in luck. Mum was eating her dinner too. I scribbled a note:
Josie’s dad was going to drop us off at the zoo tomorrow, but now he has to work. Could you take us and then pick us up please?

She stopped eating and looked at me. I felt her judge me again –
why can you not ask me this with your
voice? I always felt her judgement when she looked at me, always had done and I guess I always would.

‘Yes,’ she said, and my head almost fell off in shock. ‘What time do you want to go?’

CHAPTER 31

Dear Dad,

It’s been the longest day and I can’t tell you all of it now, but I’ll tell you some of it while it’s still fresh in my mind.

I was scared Lara was going to be distant with me after our date, as it didn’t end at all according to plan. But she hasn’t. We’ve been hanging out together more, mostly in the library or the new coffee shop in town. Just half an hour here and there when she has time. But on our own more, like she’s happy to be alone with me now without Rachel and Toby and all the others around. I told her I wanted to see more of her and was that OK, and she said yes, but she was busy. She was a bit cagey about telling me why, but eventually I got it out of her. She’s been doing some campaigning for those people who ran the meeting she took me to, ActionX. Said they were doing some good work at the moment and she wanted to give some support. Then she told me about a march in London and asked me if I wanted to come with her.

I felt like it was a test. Obviously, Dad, you know I had to pass it. And when she told me what it was about, well, they’ve got a point. Someone should be stopping this stuff from going on.

She met me at the train station. She had this little smile when she saw me, this little smile that totally slayed me. My heart leaped so high I wondered how it could still be in my chest. It was . . .
trusting
of me in a way I’d never seen from her before. With it, and with every move, every word, more and more, she reels me in and I don’t care how fast I’m caught.

‘Hey,’ she said. ‘So are you still up for this?’

‘Completely.’

‘You know it could get heavy?’

‘I know.’

She grinned. The platform announcer called the train. ‘Let’s do this then,’ she said.

There was evidence of what was coming even at the station when we got off the train in London. I could see it in a grimness around the eyes and the mouths of some of the people making their way down to the Embankment where the march was scheduled to start. Professional protesters, all looking like the ActionX people, a sameness to how they dressed and, yes, a sameness to their expressions on a day like this. I glanced at Lara – I could see it in her face too, that strange elation and a sort of deadliness.

I’ve never felt anything like the vibes from the crowd as they gathered on the Embankment. The noise was deafening; the rattles and whistles and chanting made my ears ring until I could no longer hear what Lara said as she read instructions from her phone. Her eyes were shining with battle-joy though and she mimed directions to me. We broke off from the crowd and headed down the side of the route towards a pub, where we met a group I recognised from the night of the meeting. They were the ones leafleting after the talk. Even if I hadn’t seen the faces before I would have known them by their clothes and a look of oneness about them.

And in the middle of them, Dillon. He had a certain presence even off the podium.

‘Hey, Lara,’ one of the younger guys said.

‘Hi, Tyler.’ She smiled at an older girl. ‘Hi, Katrin.’

The girl looked at us with a strange expression. I couldn’t make it out. For a second it looked like disgust, but she masked it quickly. ‘New recruit?’ She nodded towards me.

‘Yeah, he’s up for it. He knows what to expect.’

‘First demo?’

‘No, we’ve been out on one together before.’

Dillon was watching me with curiosity, and something else I couldn’t put my finger on. What was it with these guys? Did they go to some special training camp for impenetrability?

‘I’m Katrin,’ the older girl said. ‘I’m directing things on the ground so if I tell you to do something –’

‘Then I do as you tell me.’ I sensed the faster they understood I wasn’t going to go maverick on them under pressure, the better.

She thawed a bit and almost smiled. ‘Yes. Speaking of directing things, Dillon, shouldn’t you be out of here by now?’

‘Yeah. Now everyone’s here and we’re ready to roll, I’ll get gone.’ He slipped off through the crowd a lot more easily than I’d found it to get through.

‘Does he know the codes?’ Katrin asked Lara. Lara shook her head. ‘Stay close to her then,’ she said to me. ‘If we have to use the phones to keep in touch, Lara knows what to do.’

A sudden roar from the crowd alerted us to the people starting to move. The march was finally beginning.

It wasn’t what I expected. I’d seen the news. I’d been on the Loxton protest with Lara. I thought I knew what I was in for.

By 4 p.m. I knew I was a naive fool.

It was around noon when we started to march and it seemed good-natured. We made our way slowly down the Embankment, too many people for us to do more than move at a crawl. And then we turned into Westminster. That’s when I started to notice things, like the groups of skinny, black-clothed people sitting around on steps drinking cans of Special Brew, with animal face masks pushed just far back enough to allow them to drink, but not far enough for the CCTV to identify their faces.

‘They’re not with us,’ Lara mouthed when she saw me staring.

‘Do you know them?’

She shrugged. ‘Ish. They’re OK. Not bad to have around when it gets nasty.’

I wasn’t scared, Dad, but I wasn’t at all easy with it either.

As we passed Portcullis House, I had to laugh at the policemen on the steps guarding the entrance to Parliament. Their bombproof gear of densely padded puffy trousers made them stand with their legs splayed out. ‘Gangsta!’ I said to Lara and her face lit up with laughter.

I loved seeing her like this, so alive.

The chanting and shouting and whistling reached fever pitch outside the House of Commons and the crowd slowed to a halt. We stood together as one body, shouting at the top of our lungs. It must have been as audible inside as it was out there. I was light-headed, elated . . . it really felt like we were doing something important here. It felt like someone MUST listen.